The sci-fi Christmas special is a unique window into British culture – where the joy of the season always meet despair and decline, says Will Cooling

In his unofficial role as Donald Trump’s lead cheerleader-cum-adviser, Elon Musk welcomed the now withdrawn nomination of Matt Gaetz to be America’s next Attorney General by calling him the “Judge Dredd” the country needed to clean up his judicial system. This attracted cries from progressives, who rightly noted that the star of British sci-fi comic 2000 AD is an unreconstructed fascist from a dystopian future.

2000 AD had no idea that Dredd would have a guest role in America’s never-ending political squabbles as they prepared his story in their supersized holiday special. Christmas comes to Mega City One with a timely weather control fault allowing for seasonal snow, whilst the magic of the season allows the veteran lawman to encounter his younger self in a plot that deliberately harks back to A Christmas Carol. Ken Niemand and David Roach’s story mixes violent future fantasy with scenes of huddled masses, underworld vice,........

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